Many thanks to Cecelia Vincent for contributing this photo essay on Castle Market, Sheffield. Cecelia is a student at King Edward VII sixth form studying photography, history and politics. She grew up in the Burngreave area of Sheffield and has a real interest in community, people, and their environments. Her photographs investigate often-overlooked normalities and mundane places in a simple, realist style. Cecelia has photographically documented many spaces in and around Sheffield, including Park Hill flats and the abandoned Canon Brewery.
Castle Market was not only Sheffield’s primary meat, fish, veg and everything-else-imaginable market, but it was a link with the past and a mark of cultural evolution. Built upon the remains of the Sheffield Castle, which dates back to the thirteenth century, the market gave Sheffielders a sense of identity, place and comfort. It is no surprise that many of its storeowners and regular customers, felt little desire to move their routines to the new Moor Market.
This is my photographic narrative of the closure of Castle Market in the autumn of 2013. There is a sense of irony in how I found so much interest, beauty and life in a building that was soon to be neglected.
